I have been coming across MGM with dashes between the words and some without so which be the correct way?

There is no CORRECT answer, the answer is the film. That is important to understand. In the early years it was Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, in 1968 , they became MGM for a brief period, then they became Metro Goldwyn Mayer. That is important information for the history of the Company. This is true of ALL studios.

Walt Disney Pictures is relatively new in the scheme of things, under Ron Millre's leadership they were Walt Disney Productions and so on.

Go with the DATA, don't try to interpret.

Skip

LOL, Cass

Skip

Quoting Danae Cassandra:

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Skip's right, studios should be as credited in the film.

No, he's not right at all. That's what he'd like, but nowhere do the rules say that. Instead, the rules actually go out of their way to allow for devation: they tell us not to abbreviate (apparently even if the credits do so), go on to say we're to use "correct names for studios", whatever that may be, and ultimately point to the forums to ask "if unsure". All that certainly is a far cry from "simply enter what you see". If that was the intent, none of that was needed.

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Since we know that Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer, Metro Goldwin Meyer, MGM and M-G-M are all the same company, it would be nice if they would link together.

Indeed. As described above, we just use the "correct name" for it, and then that works fine.

Quoting Danae Cassandra:

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Hmm, that's an interesting point.  I was definitely under the impression that the rules said we were to enter the studio name as it is correct and as credited, without locality suffixes and without corporate entity suffixes ... so entering Loew's instead of Loew's Incorporated, and The Criterion Collection instead of Criterion.  But with studios that have changed their names over the years, such as MGM, I thought we were supposed to enter the name as it existed when the studio made the picture in question.

Well, opinions differ, obviously. I'm just pointing out that the rules clearly don't say "enter the studios exactly as credited on-screen" - with an added note about the suffixes perhaps. They could have easily said so, but they don't. As always, everyone will gladly offer their own interpretation of what is there, but again: nothing would have been simpler than to just put a simple line like that. But a conscious decision was made not to do that, but instead allow us to use the full and "correct" studio names.

Quoting T!M:

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Quoting Danae Cassandra:

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Skip's right, studios should be as credited in the film.

No, he's not right at all. That's what he'd like, but nowhere do the rules say that. Instead, the rules actually go out of their way to allow for devation: they tell us not to abbreviate (apparently even if the credits do so), go on to say we're to use "correct names for studios", whatever that may be, and ultimately point to the forums to ask "if unsure". All that certainly is a far cry from "simply enter what you see". If that was the intent, none of that was needed.

Quote:
Since we know that Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer, Metro Goldwin Meyer, MGM and M-G-M are all the same company, it would be nice if they would link together.

Indeed. As described above, we just use the "correct name" for it, and then that works fine.

Who defines the "correct" name?

Tim since you are so knowledgeable, would care to explain why this is so and what was done about it and why?

Skip

Quoting T!M:

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Quoting Dr Pavlov:

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Who defines the "correct" name?

Skip

Well, the rules obviously can't address each and every studio, and as such, they merely point to the forums to ask "if unsure". We used to have a helpful pinned thread for this, but it's gone... As it stands, I'm with Dr. Killpatient: use the current name the studio goes by.

I believe the pinned thread was moved to the User Knowledge Base, found here. Can be found under "Studio Reference". This doesn't help with this specific instance since all the names mentioned are under MGM (with dashes, without dashes and such) but I've used this on a number of occations to help me decide what to put.

Quoting Danae Cassandra:

Quote:
Hmm, that's an interesting point.  I was definitely under the impression that the rules said we were to enter the studio name as it is correct and as credited, without locality suffixes and without corporate entity suffixes ... so entering Loew's instead of Loew's Incorporated, and The Criterion Collection instead of Criterion.  But with studios that have changed their names over the years, such as MGM, I thought we were supposed to enter the name as it existed when the studio made the picture in question.

This is where things get fuzzy.  As T!M says, opinions vary.  Some people believe that the 'correct' name should be the current name.  Others, like myself, believe it should be the name that is in the credits.  I am against T!M's line of thinking for various reason, not the least of which is the constant changing of the data.

Let's take one studio as an example...Marvel.  They have released films under the following names:
Marvel Enterprises
Marvel Entertainment
Marvel Entertainment Group
Marvel Studios

If they change their name tomorrow, do I have to go back and change all those profiles to the new 'correct' name?  I am sorry, but that just doesn't make any sense to me.